A Zoo Out There
by Sita Z
Summary: Trip finds himself on the wrong side of the bars, and Malcolm wonders if any of this was included in his job description. My entry for Get Trip into Trouble Month.
1. Chapter 1

Written for Get Trip into Trouble Month 2008. No beta on this one, so please excuse any mistakes!

* * *

Chapter 1

The throng of people stretched almost to the stall that sold the admission tickets. Voices filled the room, the unhappy squalling of infants, the excited chattering of the young ones, the quiet, admonitory replies of the adults. Towards the front of the crowd, the noises became subdued, turning into whispers and the occasional nervous laughter. Tails swished back and forth, neck hair bristled, small children demanded to be picked up; the braver ones for a better look, the more timid ones seeking the safety of their parents' arms. A daring she-child ventured forward, slipped under the barrier and knocked on the glass that separated the masses from the object of their curiosity. One of the security guards caught her and lifted her over the chain, depositing her in the arms of her waiting mother. Expectantly, the crowd stretched to see if there would be a reaction on the other side of the glass, but they were disappointed.

"No dawdling," the Chief Guard called, waving at the people filing past. "And please mind your children. We don't want to frighten it."

"Is it dangerous?" an elderly man wanted to know.

The Chief Guard laughed. "Not at all. It's probably more scared of you than you are of it."

"I'm not scared," the man muttered indignantly, and not quite truthfully, if his furtive glances at the window were any indication. But then, they were all scared, to some degree. They had never seen such a thing before.

Not that it looked particularly intimidating. In fact, as some of the children remarked, it was "cute", if such a term could be applied to a being as strange as this one. It was small; standing up, it barely reached the waist of a grown adult. Its limbs were delicate, with five knobby fingers on each end, and no claws. It had no tail either, and no teeth to speak of, only useless little stumps where rows of razor-sharp fangs should have been. Maybe it was sick, some of the adults speculated among themselves; its fur looked mangy and thin, except for the fuzzy, yellow patch on its head. Its face was round, pink and mostly furless as well, and its eyes were blue, or so the guards said. The crowd couldn't see for themselves. The being kept its head turned away most of the time.

The showing had been going on for six days, and if anything, the demand for tickets had increased. Some protested that a scientific discovery of such importance should not be used for profit, but no one really listened. People were willing to pay high prices to get a glimpse at the "space monster", as the yellow press unkindly titled it in their headlines. But it was not a monster, most agreed after their visit. Strange, yes, and a bit frightening in its differentness, but not the hideous, deformed creature they had expected. For double the price, visitors could watch when it was fed. A keeper in protective clothing would enter, walk over to the being (this always drew a gasp from the crowd) and set down a feeding dish filled with fruit and vegetables. People would wonder how the scientists knew what a being from outer space liked to eat, and the Chief Guard would explain that they had analyzed its feces, to find out what kind of diet it needed. "Feces?" a child had asked once, and the guard had pointed at a bucket in the corner of the tiled showing room.

"That's where it... you know."

The child had giggled.

More often than not, the being would not eat. Crouched in its corner, it kept its head turned away, ignoring the food and the expectant crowd outside. The keeper would wait for a while, then kneel down next to it, carefully take one of those pink, hairless arms and turn the being around. One of the keepers, made nervous by the audience, had become impatient when the being wouldn't touch the food. He had grabbed it hard and smacked it when it still refused to take a piece. The being had cried out, and the crowd had uttered a collective gasp of outrage. Only a short time later, the first demonstrators appeared in front of the building, demanding better treatment for "our alien visitor" and a letter of dismissal for the keeper. He was fired on the same day. After that, the designated caretakers took great pains to be gentle with their charge, coaxing it with endless patience to finish its meals.

The showing always ended an hour before sunset, because the being "needed its rest", as the guards would explain to the disappointed visitors. They did not say that the creature spent its "resting time" strapped to an examination table, that it often fell asleep only to be prodded awake again for more tests, that it sometimes screamed with pain and poured out words in its strange, high-pitched voice, those alien eyes filling with all-too-ordinary tears. The scientists didn't mean to hurt it; they simply didn't know enough about its physiology. An injection of apomorphine, intended to calm it down, caused several hours of uncontrollable vomiting and diarrhea (and everyone agreed that the results had smelled worse than anything they had ever encountered in the lab). Afterwards, it lay panting on its blankets, shuddering convulsively from time to time. One of the younger assistants sat down next to it, stroking its spiky yellow fur and feeding it sips of water, the only safe antidote they could think of. Water always seemed to do it good.

It wasn't the most cooperative of study objects. It struggled when they tied it down, yanked at the straps, and snarled at the lab assistants. Once, it had escaped, running down the hallway with surprising speed. The Chief Guard had caught it, dragging it back to the lab and ignoring its noisy protests. After that, the Chief Scientist ordered that it was to wear leg restraints at all times, for its own safety, she said. If it got away, it might fall into the hands of the wrong people. After all, there were those who had called for its immediate destruction.

"What is it called?" the curious she-child, the one who had knocked on the glass, asked the guards. "Does it have a name?"

The Chief Guard's tail quivered in amusement. "We don't know. We can't ask it."

"Why not?"

"We don't speak its language," the guard answered. "We can't talk to it."

"Have you tried?" the child wanted to know, but her mother shushed her before she could say more.

"Quiet, little one. A child with too many questions is a child who does not get sweets for her evening meal."

Sulking, the she-child was pulled away. The guard looked after them thoughtfully. No, they hadn't tried. But what would a being so different, so alien, tell them? Only things no one wanted to know, tales of strange worlds and potential dangers out beyond.

No one wanted to hear such things.

"No dawdling," he called again, turning back to the crowd. "We're expecting another thousand visitors before closing time!"

* * *

"They call themselves the Nuwa..." The word ended in a strange combination of hissing and snarling. Hoshi smiled slightly. "At least that's the closest I can come to their pronunciation."

Malcolm looked at the image on the display. The species was humanoid, more or less, if one ignored the fact that the average adult was about four meters tall, covered in short, dark fur, and possessed fangs, claws and a tail. A very long, very bushy tail.

"Giant chipmunks," Travis commented, voicing Malcolm's first thought when he had seen the Nuwa-whatevers' backside appendage.

The Captain didn't seem amused. "What about their technology?"

"They are not warp-capable," T'Pol replied. "Their computer technology is rather advanced, as is their knowledge of science and medicine. They do not seem very interested in space travel, however. It is unlikely that they will develop impulse drive within the next century."

"Exploration isn't exactly frowned upon," Hoshi picked up again. "But they don't actively seek the unknown. A few centuries ago, xenophobia was still widespread in their culture. They fought three world wars over it."

Archer's face had settled into grim lines as he listened. "I take it first contact is out of the question."

T'Pol paused before she answered, and Malcolm suspected that she was trying to be as diplomatic as possible. "It would do great damage to their culture as it is now, Captain, and could possibly lead to a new war. The political situation is hardly stable."

Malcolm returned his attention to the display. The screen showed two images; the male and female Nuwa!r Hoshi had downloaded from the aliens' planetary database, and the ground structures of a city. One of the buildings on the map, a large compound from the looks of it, had been enlarged and highlighted red. If Hoshi's translations of the newspaper headlines were correct, Trip was being held somewhere inside the compound; and not only held, but displayed to the public like a curiosity at a zoo. Only that Trip was the only inhabitant of the zoo, and attracted a far greater crowd than polar bears or elephants. Which, unfortunately, complicated the tactical situation considerably. They couldn't get a transporter lock or even a bio sign, thanks to the aliens' technology interfering with Enterprise's scanning equipment. An armed rescue team would be the next option, but it was nearly impossible to stage a successful recovery operation if hundreds of curious aliens were crowded around Trip's... cage. It wasn't exactly a cage; on the news images Hoshi had downloaded, it looked more like a holding cell with a huge glass window where the forth wall would have been. The pictures weren't very good, but it seemed that Trip was okay, more or less. Or so Phlox said. Malcolm was only willing to believe what he saw with his own eyes, on one of the doctor's bio monitors. There could be injuries that didn't show on the surface.

_They could have left him his clothes_, he thought. Maybe the Nuwa!r's intentions weren't necessarily evil, only natural curiosity coupled with ignorance, but it should be obvious that the alien they had captured was a sentient being.

"So, what options do we have?" Archer sounded impatient. "We can't beam him out, we can't beam in, and we can't make our presence known. Although I'm not completely ruling out the last possibility." He held up a hand to forestall T'Pol's objections. "It's a last resort. But I won't wait much much longer."

Malcolm silently agreed, thinking of the news image again. Trip had been huddled in a corner, his knees drawn to his chest and his head averted from the crowd of spectators. Even if he was physically unharmed, that was not to say he was all right. They had to get him out of there.

Or, if they couldn't get him _out_...

"Captain," Malcolm said. "I'd like to make a suggestion..."

* * *

Trip was beginning to hate feeding time most of all. Not because of the crowd outside; they always stared, no matter what he did, and meal times were no different. No, he didn't mind their goggling eyes and excited pointing so much. If only the food hadn't tasted so damn disgusting. All his chipmunk keepers ever brought him was fruit and vegetables, and sometimes unidentifiable yellow... objects... that looked like bugs, of all things. Trip hadn't touched those, no matter how often the keepers dangled them enticingly in front of his nose. The other stuff was awful enough, thank you very much. Some of it was simply bland, like damp styrofoam; the rest left a vile taste in his mouth as if he had eaten, well, something one usually wouldn't even touch, let alone use for consumption.

A hand the size of a tennis racket prodded him, and Trip raised his head. The keeper was still kneeling in front of him, gesturing at the feeding dish he – or she - had set down on the tiled floor. At least there were no yellow bugs mixed in with the fruit this time.

"I'm not hungry," Trip said.

The keeper answered in his throaty, snarling language, his tail swishing back and forth.

"Sorry." Trip leaned back against the wall, careful not to look too closely at the disgusting contents of the dish. "That shot your doctors gave me last night musta messed with my stomach. I'm not feeling too hot today."

He couldn't really read the expressions on those large, hairy faces, but he had the distinct impression that the keeper was becoming impatient. The dish was pushed towards him, accompanied by more snarling and hissing.

Trip pushed it back. "Look, I don't want it! Understand? No!" He shook his head, rested one hand on his stomach and pulled a pained grimace. He didn't even have to pretend; his bowels felt as if he had downed a cup of bleaching agent.

His attempts at communicating seemed to confuse the keeper. He took a piece of fruit out of the bowl, holding it deftly between his large, clawed fingers as he brought it up to Trip's mouth.

Trip turned his head away.

The alien spoke again, his snarling beginning to sound annoyed. Trip withdrew further into his corner. The keeper who had slapped him hadn't returned, so he assumed that the aliens didn't want to see him abused. Still, facing a giant chipmunk was bad enough; facing an angry one would give anyone the heebie-jeebies.

The fruit was held in front of his mouth again.

"You guys don't know how to take a hint, do you? I said I-" The rest of his sentence was muffled by the fruit the keeper had quickly stuffed into his mouth. Trip gagged at the putrid taste, trying to spit out the offending item, but the keeper had one hand under his chin and another one clamped over his lips, effectively preventing him from opening his mouth. For lack of alternatives, Trip swallowed the fruit whole. The keeper let go of him and picked up another piece of fruit. The crowd cheered.

Having learned his lesson, Trip kept his lips firmly pressed together when the next lumpy, dripping piece was brought up to his face. His stomach was protesting noisily against the unwelcome nutrition, and it was all he could do not to vomit in front of the keeper's feet.

The alien said something, sounding amused.

_Yeah, it's all a goddamn joke to you, isn't it_, Trip thought, glaring at the large being even though he was pretty sure that it couldn't read his facial expressions any more than vice versa. _You're not the one who spends his nights with probes stuck down his throat – or the other end – and I don't see you crapping into a bucket in front of a cheerful crowd. Kinda hard to see the funny aspects from this side of the microscope._

He would have liked to say all of that aloud, but he knew that if he opened his mouth, the fruit would be in there before he could say "unfair". Besides, there was little sense in talking to them. He didn't speak Chipmunk, and his attempts at non-verbal communication had passed without notice. Maybe they didn't even realize that he was sentient... or didn't want to realize it. Although his clothes and equipment should have been hint enough.

The alien reached for him, and Trip shrank back, but not in time to avoid the giant fingers pinching his nose shut. It was painful to say the least. And he couldn't breathe, not if he wanted to keep his mouth closed to avoid the food. His head buzzing from the lack of oxygen, Trip pulled weakly at the keeper's hand, which didn't budge one inch.

The alien seemed to be laughing, although Trip couldn't tell for sure. The faces around him were beginning to blur, merging into a mass of dark brown spots, and his mouth opened seemingly on its own, gasping for much-needed air. Instantly, the fruit was pushed into his mouth. It tasted of soap, metal and mouldy grass. Coughing and retching, Trip spat it out, missing the keeper's feet by mere centimeters.

"I said, I'm not hungry!"

He batted the alien's hands away, turning towards the wall. Before he averted his eyes, he saw that some of people outside had stopped laughing. Their expressions were serious, disapproving even. Always assuming that was he was seeing amounted to disapproval in giant chipmunks.

_Good_, he thought as he curled into a tight ball. Maybe the keeper would give up if the crowd was getting upset. He didn't think he could suppress his nausea any longer if he was fed another piece of fruit, and he didn't particularly want to puke all over the floor. Given his luck of late, they would find his response to be of scientific interest and would try to provoke the same reaction again, maybe by force-feeding him one of those yellow bugs. The mere thought made him shudder with disgust.

The keeper seemed to recognize a lost case when he saw one. Trip heard him getting to feet, and the sound of the door opening and closing. Now he would be left alone for another five or six hours, until the visitors went home and the assistants came to take him to the lab.

He closed his eyes. Enterprise had better get here soon.

TBC...

Please let me know what you think!


	2. Chapter 2

Thank you for your kind reviews, I'm glad you're enjoying the story!

* * *

Chapter 2

Some crewmembers said that Commander Tucker had a knack for finding trouble, but Malcolm thought that it was an unfair assessment. Trip didn't need to go looking for trouble; trouble found him, and more often than not, made sure that he ended up in nothing more than his blue regulation underwear. This time, trouble had literally gone the full monty: Trip was sitting stark naked in an alien showing cell, and the Captain was wearing a hole in the deckplating, while T'Pol was driving everyone to distraction with her "logical cautioning" against first contact.

Well, it wouldn't be a first contact. Not if he did his job right.

It really hadn't been Trip's fault this time, rather a combination of unfortunate circumstances and mere bad luck – although their Chief Engineer admittedly was a magnet for both. They had been testing a new impulse engine for the shuttlepods when Enterprise had picked up a distress call. Reluctant to interrupt the testing when it was in a critical stage, Trip had suggested he stay behind in a shuttlepod and continue his modifications until Enterprise came back. Malcolm had recommended that a security detail stay with him, only to get the usual don't-be-so-paranoid dismissal. One day he was going to write it on their tombstones: _"We don't need phase pistols, Lieutenant." – "They seem friendly enough, Malcolm." – "Put the rifles back." – "We're just going to have a look around. Nothing to worry about."_

Famous last words. Well, of course Trip had stayed behind on his own, and of course the new engine had malfunctioned, forcing him to crashland on the only Minshara-class planet nearby. Which, of course, was inhabited by giant chipmunks, who liked to lock aliens in cages and put them on display for public entertainment.

If Malcolm was lucky, the latter would work to their advantage. Pressing himself against the tree that served him as a temporary hiding place, he peered at the settlement below. It was a farmhouse of sorts, if the cattle in the nearby enclosure were any indication. It would do for his purposes.

He slipped out from behind the tree, still hidden in the grass that reached up almost to his chin. One of the aliens was sitting on the steps in front of the farmhouse, and if he wasn't completely mistaken, it was a child at play. A child with a bushy tail, fangs and claws that could rip him apart with one sweep of those large hands.

Sighing, Malcolm began to make his way down the hill.

* * *

Fer!i was a zoo keeper. Well, not really; it would take at least ten more sun-rounds before she could think of learning a profession, like Mother and her older siblings. But she was pretending to be one, and her zoo was a lot nicer than the one she'd seen in town the other day. There were toys in her zoo and real beds, not just a pile of blankets in one corner. Her strange-creatures weren't tied up, and they were paired off in their cages so they wouldn't be lonely. She had asked Mother yesterday why the strange-creature was all alone, why he had no friends to keep him company, but Mother had still been angry because Fer!i had slipped away from her, and had not answered her question. Fer!i had not meant to make Mother angry. She had simply wanted to see if the strange-creature would look at her if she knocked on the glass. He seemed so alone in there, so unhappy. Maybe he would like some company. But the zoo keepers hadn't let her talk to him, and Mother had scolded her on the way home. All in all, it hadn't been a very nice outing.

Today, Fer!i had decided to build her own zoo. She had lined up several old boxes she had found in the shed, and had put two of her animal-dolls in each of them, but they were allowed out if they wanted to. She fed them water and bits of cake, and took them to the doctor if they were sick.

"No fighting," she warned two of her more troublesome inmates. "Strange-creatures who fight are strange-creatures who get no sweets for their evening meal."

Something moved in the grass close by, and Fer!i glanced up. Had one of the _le'ka _broken out of their paddock? They sometimes did, and went into the garden to eat Mother's vegetables. If it was one of the _le'ka_, she had better run into the house and let someone know.

But she couldn't see anything, and after a moment returned her attention to her zoo.

"Time for school," she told her strange-creatures, who pulled faces and groaned at her announcement. Fer!i wasn't the most enthusiastic student herself.

"We'll do something fun," she promised them. "We'll run into the forest when the teacher isn't looking, and play catch-the-_kirn!h_ until it's time to go home."

Her strange-creatures seemed to like the idea.

The grass rustled, and Fer!i looked up again, expecting to see the stupid round eyes of a _le'ka_ peering at her. Instead, she found herself face-to-face with another strange-creature. A real one. It was standing only a few steps away, making strange chattering noises. Its little pink hands were raised, the knobby fingers splayed out. She saw that there were five of them, not four.

"Hello," she said. "Are you looking for your friend?"

The strange-creature came closer, still chattering.

"Are you a boy or a girl?" Fer!i asked. "I think you are a boy. The one they have in town is a boy, too. The zoo keepers told us."

She picked up a piece of cake and held it out to him. "Here," she said. "You can have more, if you want to. I made lots. And you can pick one of the cages, if you like."

She would have to find a larger one for him, she decided. He was a lot bigger than her animal-dolls.

"I'll find you one later," she promised. "Can I pet you? The zoo keepers wouldn't let anyone pet your friend in town. They said he wouldn't like it."

The strange-creature was close enough to touch now, and she reached out, carefully petting the dark brown fur on top of his head. It felt soft. She ran her fingers over his strange blue coverings, gently tugging at them. He looked at her and opened his mouth, showing her his little white stumps.

She laughed. "Your teeth look funny."

He chattered, and she held out the cake again. "Here. It's really good."

But he didn't seem to want the cake. Maybe he wanted her to help him find his friend, she thought.

"I can't take you to your friend," she said, hoping that he wouldn't be disappointed. "I'm sorry. He's in town, in a zoo. But you don't have to go there. You can stay here with me, if you like."

"Fer!i!"

The cry had come from the house. Fer!i turned and saw Mother standing in the door, her eyes wide and round with fear.

"Fer!i, get away from it, quickly!"

"Mother!" She climbed to her feet and picked up the strange-creature, hugging him to herself. "Look what I found! Can I keep him?"

"Fer!i!" Mother came running towards her, her tail bristling. "Put it down, now! Let go of that thing!"

"But I want to keep him!" Seeing that Mother wanted to take away her new friend, Fer!i took a step back. "I'll make a nice bed for him, and I'll feed him every day, and, and I'll take him outside if he needs to go, I promise! Please!"

But Mother didn't listen to her. She snatched the strange-creature out of Fer!i's arms and held him dangling by one leg, as if he were a stinky old floorcloth.

"No!" Fer!i began to cry. "You're hurting him!"

"Get into the house, now!" Mother sounded panicky, frightening Fer!i even more. The strange-creature was still hanging upside-down in the air, flailing his short arms about and chattering louder than ever.

"Fer!i! I said, go into the house!"

Fer!i didn't move. "I want to keep him! Please! I found him, he's my friend! Put him down!"

Ignoring her, Mother grabbed one of the empty water barrels and dropped the strange-creature into it. Fer!i heard a dull thud as he hit the bottom of the barrel, and began to cry harder.

"Don't! Don't hurt him!"

But the strange-creature seemed to be alright, and was already trying to climb out of the barrel again. Mother pushed him back inside and placed a board on the opening, and a heavy rock on top of the board. Fer!i could see his little pink hands as they pushed against the board, but it was too heavy for him. He was trapped.

Tearfully, she looked up at Mother. "Why did you put him in there? I was going to make him a bed."

"Oh, little one!"

Suddenly, Fer!i found herself in Mother's arms, pulled into a tight hug. Mother seemed close to tears herself, although Fer!i had no idea why. Inside the barrel, she could hear the strange-creature's muffled chattering.

"I think he's scared," she said. "He wants you to let him out so he can play with me."

Mother hugged her even harder. "He's going to have to stay in there for a while," she said, sounding calmer now. Fer!i was relieved. Mother was never scared.

"How long?" she asked.

"Until the town people come and pick him up," Mother said.

Fresh tears welled up in Fer!i's eyes. "But he's my friend! He wants to stay with me!"

"Don't cry, little one." Mother began to lick her ears comfortingly. "They'll take good care of him."

"But his friend's not happy in their zoo," Fer!i said. "I could make him a nicer one."

"I know you could," Mother replied, walking towards the house with Fer!i in her arms. "But we can't keep him. Come on, I need to make some calls."

Sadly, Fer!i looked back at the barrel. "Can I visit him in town? Tomorrow? And bring him some sweets? Please?"

Mother sighed.

* * *

Something was going on. Trip could hear excited voices outside, and doors slamming. The commotion had been going on for a while, and strangely enough, no one had come to take him to the lab, although the last visitors were long gone. Not that he was complaining; anything that kept them from strapping him to that table of theirs was a welcome event in his book. But he would really like to know what was going on. Perhaps Enterprise had made first contact, he thought. He had wondered before why they didn't just beam him out, but maybe something was interfering with the transporter. Always assuming they had discovered where he was. Always assuming they had returned from answering the distress call. Always assuming... but he wasn't going to go there, not if he wanted to hang onto the shreds of his sanity a while longer. Of course Enterprise was okay, and of course they would come to get him out. Anything else didn't bear thinking about.

Another door slammed, and Trip could hear steps approaching. There were several people, from the sounds, and they were talking animatedly among themselves. Maybe a new bunch of scientists had arrived to study him. Trip cringed at the thought. Their tests, although not deliberately designed to cause him pain, were anything but pleasant.

He retreated further into his corner when the door lock was disengaged. It wasn't feeding time yet, so he assumed they had come to take him to the lab. Hopefully, he would be spared another injection tonight.

The door opened, and Trip instantly realized that the assistants hadn't come to take him away for tonight's series of tests. There were four of them rather than the usual two, and they were carrying a big container between them... a container with a vented lid. Trip bit down on his lip. Whatever this was, it couldn't be good.

One of the aliens began to talk to him, in what Trip believed to be a soothing tone. By now, he was convinced that the container was for him, and wherever they were planning to take him, he had a feeling he would like it even less than this place. Maybe they had decided that they had studied him long enough, and wanted to see what the insides of his body looked like.

The lid of the container was opened, and Trip tensed. No way he would climb in there willingly. If they were here to take him to the dissecting table, they'd have to come and get him.

Then, a hand appeared on the container's edge, and Trip froze, shocked out of his mounting panic. A dark-haired head followed the hand, and a moment later, Malcolm Reed was standing up inside the container. A buck-naked Malcolm Reed, sporting a large bruise over his left eyebrow.

"Hello, Commander," he said.

Trip jumped up, only to regret it a second later when a strong wave of dizziness washed over him. He grabbed the wall to steady himself.

"Malcolm!"

"Fancy meeting you here," Malcolm said, before he was grabbed under the arms by one of the aliens and lifted out of the container. Once he was standing on the tiled floor of the cell, Trip saw why he hadn't climbed out of the container himself. On Malcolm's ankles were the same leg restraints he had been treated to after his escape attempt, a pair of padded cuffs connected by a short chain. Obviously, the aliens were taking no chances this time.

The four assistants watched in rapt fascination, talking in their throaty language and taking notes on large paper pads. Malcolm glanced up at them.

"Rather intimidating up close," he stated.

"You have no idea." Trip had slid back down onto his blankets, deciding that it would be a good idea to give those wobbly legs of his a break. "What's goin' on? Is Enterprise okay?"

Taking slow, small steps, the only kind of walking the restraints allowed, Malcolm came over to sit down next to him. Behind him, the aliens scribbled furiously, one of them holding what seemed to be a recording device of sorts.

"Enterprise is fine," he said, eyeing Trip. "Hiding behind one of the planetary moons and waiting to take us aboard."

Trip closed his eyes, allowing himself a moment of pure, sweet relief. Malcolm was here to get him out. It was going to be okay.

"You don't look too well," Malcolm observed. Trip opened his eyes again. The Lieutenant was frowning at him, obviously not liking what he was seeing. Trip had only caught glimpses of his reflection in the window, but what he had seen had looked like a bruised, emaciated, bone-tired shadow of himself. Which was exactly how he felt.

He ran a hand over his face. "It's been kinda rough," he admitted. "I haven't been getting a lot of sleep these days."

Malcolm patted his arm. "You'll be in sickbay in no time. Dr. Phlox is waiting for you with a hypospray full of the Good Stuff."

Trip grinned weakly. "So, what's the master plan?"

"Well, at nightfall Lancelot, Galahad and I leap out of the rabbit..."

At that, Trip laughed for the first time in over a week. He must be looking pretty damn miserable for Lieutenant Malcolm Reed to abandon his air of formality and joke during a rescue mission. "I hope you've got a back-up plan to that one."

"Actually, we do." Malcolm sobered again, glancing at the four aliens who were still watching and scribbling away on their padds. "Are you positive they can't understand what we're saying?"

"Believe me, I've been tryin' to talk to them for the last eight days. They don't even try to listen."

"Good." Malcolm threw a quick glance over his shoulder, then continued, "Their technology is interfering with the transporter signal, so we couldn't beam you out."

Trip nodded. "I thought so."

"We discovered that it would be fairly simple to boost the signal if we had a beacon to lock onto, but of course we couldn't beam it in."

"So..."

"... we had to find another way of taking it into the building," Malcolm finished for him. "They're going to beam us both out as soon as I activate the beacon."

"So, what're you waitin' for?" Trip asked. If he never saw this place again as long as he lived, it was fine with him, and the sooner he got out of here the better.

"T'Pol said we should wait until no one's observing us," Malcolm replied with a nod towards the aliens. "To avoid cultural contamination."

Trip clenched his teeth in frustration. "That's not gonna happen, Malcolm. They're-"

He broke off. One of the aliens, a tall guy with a white-tipped tail, had stopped scribbling and was coming towards them. Trip saw that he was concealing something in his hand, something that looked familiar.

"Malcolm, watch out!"

The other man whirled around, but it was too late. The alien had plunged the hypodermic needle deep into his upper arm, emptying its contents into Malcolm's bloodstream. Trip recognized only too well what happened next; Malcolm's eyes clouded over, his face becoming slack, as if someone had drained all strength out of his body. Without so much as a sound, he collapsed onto the pile of blankets.

"Leave him alone!" Trip tried to hold onto the unconscious man, but the alien effortlessly pushed his hands aside, picked up the limp body and slung Malcolm over his shoulder like a sack of potatoes.

"Damn you!" Biting back tears of sheer frustration, Trip watched as the four of them filed out of the room, taking Malcolm and the transportation container with them. He had no reason to believe that Malcolm would be subjected to anything worse than he had been, but he couldn't know for sure. And they'd been so close to getting away. Trip clenched his hand into a fist and hit the wall, hard. Sometimes, he wondered if the universe was doing it on purpose.

TBC...

Please let me know what you think!


	3. Chapter 3

Thank you for your reviews!

* * *

Chapter 3

Trip jerked awake when the door opened. He hadn't meant to nod off, but after several nights of hardly any sleep his eyes would drift closed on their own accord, and there was little he could do about it.

One of the lab assistants, the tall one with the white-tipped tail, entered the room, Malcolm in tow. The Lieutenant was back on his own feet, looking exhausted. It was an expression Trip recognized; he had been wearing it himself after those endless nights on the examination table. Quickly, he checked Malcolm's body for any visible injuries, relieved when there were none.

The lab assistant set a fresh dish of water on the floor and left, securing the door behind him. Slowly, Malcolm came shuffling over to the pile of blankets. Trip helped him sit down, remembering how he'd felt after his first stint in the lab; tired to the point of falling over, aching in a hundred different places from the hard surface he'd been strapped to, and shaking with the memory of the humiliating and sometimes painful procedures. Malcolm had been gone for several hours, long enough for the scientists to poke and prod him quite extensively.

"You okay?" Trip asked quietly.

Malcolm closed his eyes and sighed. "I'm fine. I believe we have a problem, though."

Trip frowned. "What d'you mean?"

As an answer, Malcolm opened his mouth and pulled down his lower lip. One of his teeth was missing.

"Did they do that?" Trip asked, not quite able to believe what he was seeing. The aliens had subjected him to some rather invasive testing, but they had never intentionally hurt him, let alone taken any parts of his body.

"They noticed that it wasn't attached like the other teeth."

"What?"

Malcolm sighed. "That was where Phlox inserted the beacon."

Trip stared at him."In your tooth?"

"It was a bridge, anyway," Malcolm said defensively. "And it wasn't as if I could be choosy about the place."

Trip wisely didn't comment on the latter. "Meanin' we're stuck here?"

Malcolm nodded, looking depressed. "For the time being, I suppose we are."

"Great." Trip buried his head in his hands. "Just great."

He felt drained, more tired than he had ever been in his life, and his brain balked at the idea of having to come up with a solution to their problem. Always assuming there even _was _one.

"D'you think they found the beacon?" he asked, half-dreading the answer. If the aliens discovered that their captives' dental protrusions contained strange technology, he and Malcolm might end up toothless before long.

"I don't think so. Phlox hid it quite well. It's accessible only through a tiny hole at the side. They would have to cut the tooth apart, and even then they'd only find bits of broken microcircuitry. They might even mistake them for some sort of dental alloy."

Trip doubted that; the aliens seemed quite up-to-date to him, and anything but slow on the uptake. "How were you gonna activate it?"

Malcolm didn't answer immediately, glancing around the room. "I assume they have a camera installed in here?"

"Yeah." Trip nodded at the upper left corner next to the window. "Up there. They've been watching me 24/7."

Malcolm frowned, considering. Then he picked up one of the blankets. "Do you believe they'd become suspicious if we put this over our heads?"

"Malcolm, what..."

"Trust me, all right?" The Armory Officer gave him an impatient look.

"Okay, okay," Trip said. "I don't know _what _they'd think, but..."

"Trip-"

"...but I don't believe they'd assume we're up to somethin'." He grinned. "Not sabotage, anyway."

Malcolm rolled his eyes. "Has anyone ever told you that you have a one-track mind, Commander?"

"And that's different from you, how?"

That got him a dry look. "If you could kindly drag your mind out of the gutter, I could show you what we came up with."

"Okay, keep your shirt on." Trip shook out the blanket and pulled it over their heads. No doubt at this very moment, a bunch of excited scientists were crowded around the observation monitor, pushing each other out of the way for a better look. Trip sighed at the thought.

"Look," Malcolm said quietly, stretching out his arm for Trip to see, but with the blanket blocking out most of the light, all Trip could make out were mere silhouettes.

"I don't see a thing."

Sighing, Malcolm took his hand and placed it on the inside of his forearm, a few centimeters below the wrist. Trip startled when his fingers encountered something he had not expected.

"What is that?"

There was a bump under Malcolm's skin, a narrow protuberance about the length of Trip's little finger. It felt as if someone had pushed a fat needle into Malcolm's arm and left it there.

"Fortunately they didn't look that closely," Malcolm said next to his ear. "Phlox did an excellent job of concealing any outward traces."

Trip frowned. "Is that really under your skin?"

"Of course not." Malcolm pinched a bit of skin between his thumb and forefinger and gave it a gentle tug. It came off like a piece of adhesive foil, revealing a tiny metal tool underneath.

"Dermaplast," he explained. "Phlox and I agreed that it would be best to hide at a place that's easily accessible."

"Regular Inspector Gadget, are you?" Trip took the diminutive tool Malcolm handed him, squinting to get a better look at it in the semi-darkness. "A microspanner?"

Malcolm nodded. "It has to be inserted in the tooth to activate the beacon."

Privately, Trip thought that only their Armory Officer would come up with stealth equipment that was literally hidden in his own body. But he had to admit it was a good idea, with the small drawback that one of the crucial components was sitting under an alien microscope even as they were talking.

"Do you remember what they did with the tooth after they took it out?" he asked.

"They put it in some sort of sample container and left it on a shelf," Malcolm said. "But I doubt it's still there."

"It might be." Trip turned the microspanner between his fingers. "You know, with this it would be as easy as anything to get rid of these things." He nodded at the leg restraints.

"I don't think we'd get very far even if you Houdini'd us out of here," Malcolm replied. "I saw guards everywhere in the building."

"No," Trip agreed. "We couldn't go now, anyway. Show time's about to start."

"Show time-" Malcolm's voice faltered, then, "Please tell me I'm not the special attraction in today's program."

"You bet."

"Can't we just stay under the blanket?" Malcolm asked plaintively. "They're going to see news images of this back on the ship."

"I don't think the keepers would be very happy if we did."

Malcolm huffed. "I hope we're not expected to balance beach balls on our noses."

"Right after we jumped through the hoops," Trip said. All of this was a lot easier to bear, now that he no longer had to face it on his own. And when they made it back to the ship, he wouldn't be the only one subjected to jokes about zoos and getting into trouble at every turn. After all, Malcolm had been sitting right next to him in the cage.

The Armory Officer seemed to be thinking along similar lines. Sighing, he took the microspanner and placed it on his arm again, smoothing down the dermaplast. "We'd better find a way of getting that bloody beacon back, and soon. I refuse to-" He broke off in mid-rant. "Someone's coming."

The door lock clicked as it was being disengaged. Sitting very still in their make-shift tent, they heard steps coming closer, and Trip wasn't at all surprised when a hand grabbed the blanket and pulled it off. The large, hairy face of the white-tailed assistant peered down at them, a group of curious keepers stretching to look over his shoulders.

"Sorry, fellas," Trip said, unable to resist. "It's not what you were thinkin'."

A moment later, he yelped when Malcolm jabbed him in the ribs. In an instant, the aliens whipped out their pads and began scribbling away.

"They'd better not be writing this down as a mating ritual," Malcolm groused.

Trip sighed. It was going to be a long day.

* * *

Two hours into the showing, the guards had to close the doors of the building to keep more visitors from pouring in. Those who had bought tickets in advance protested angrily, and weren't appeased even when the guards pointed out that they would be let in a dozen at a time.

"It's a madhouse in there," the Chief Guard said, trying to fend off incensed visitors who were attempting to push past him. "You wouldn't see a thing."

"We paid good money for this!"

"I don't believe this, first you take ninety _y!i_ for a ticket and then you leave us standing out here!"

Word had gotten around quickly that another alien had been caught, and would be put on display with the first one. Journalists spurred the general excitement by offering their own theories: a spacecraft had been found and shipped off to a secret place by the government; the two beings weren't aliens at all, but the results of unscrupulous genetic experimenting; the second alien was breeding and would give birth to a litter of young soon. There was considerable disappointment when the Chief Scientist revealed in an interview that the new alien was male, too, and most definitely incapable of childbearing.

"What a pity," the interviewer commented. "I would have wanted one."

Even without the prospect of soon-to-arrive offspring, the two aliens made the front page all over the planet. Some demanded that the government destroy the captives as a warning for potential invaders, but they were a small minority. Most weren't very interested in where the aliens had come from, or why. It was exciting to get a glimpse of those strange beings, yes, but no one wanted to dwell on the idea of a planet full of such creatures, let alone the possibility of more inhabited worlds. The concept was too exotic, too unsettling. Even the journalists tended to leave this aspect unmentioned.

Fer!i wasn't aware of the impact her find had made, nor did she know about the ship full of strange-creatures that was orbiting her world, and whose captain couldn't decide whether to laugh or bang his head against the wall when he saw the news images. Mother had taken her into town, and they had been waiting patiently for three hours until they finally stood in front of the glass window.

"Hello, strange-creature!" Fer!i called, waving at her friend. He was sitting in a corner next to the other being, his short pink legs covered with a blanket. She waved again, but he didn't wave back. He didn't even seem to notice her.

"He's not happy," Fer!i said to Mother. "He wants to be let out."

Mother didn't answer immediately. Finally she said, "Maybe you're right, little one."

"Can you tell them to let him out?"

Mother's tail twitched. "I'm afraid I can't, Fer!i."

"Why not?"

"I... it's not my decision, you see. He belongs to the zoo people now, like his friend."

Fer!i hung her head. "But he was my friend first. And I wouldn't lock him up."

Mother stroked her. "I know. But I'm sure he wants to stay with his friend."

"His friend could come, too. I wouldn't mind."

Mother said nothing for a while. Then she picked Fer!i up, gently licking her ears. "How about we leave now, and buy ourselves _f'chna_ cakes on the way home? I don't really like it here, either."

Fer!i buried her head in Mother's soft fur. She no longer wanted to look at the strange-creatures, or stay here with all these people. It made her sad for a reason she didn't understand.

"Yes," she said. "I want to go home."

On the way out, she raised her head again. "Can I have two cakes? I'll share them with the strange-creatures in my zoo."

Mother laughed. "Well, we can't let them to go hungry, can we."

TBC...

Concluding chapter to come up soon! Please let me know what you think!


	4. Chapter 4

Thanks for the feedback, everyone, I'm glad you're enjoying this! And now the conclusion :)...

* * *

Chapter 4

"I swear, if this doesn't work..."

"Happy endings, Malcolm, remember? Gotta think happy endings. You said so yourself."

"Well,'happy ending' is a relative term, isn't it? It always depends on who turns out to be the happy party."

"Malcolm..."

"I'm just saying. It's quite reasonable to assume that these people would be happy if we lived out our lives in this cage of theirs. They're making quite a profit out of us, it seems."

Trip eyed the crowd filing past the window, their gawping faces and pointing fingers. He and Malcolm hadn't done anything but sit in a corner all day, but their enthusiastic audience didn't seem to mind. Once, Malcolm had gotten up and walked around for a few minutes, to get the circulation back into his legs. The crowd outside had reacted as if he had started doing cartwheels around the cell, pushing forward and shouting excitedly. Malcolm had quickly returned to the corner after that. At least neither of them had felt the need to use the "facilities" so far. Having to relieve himself into a bucket in front of an enraptured audience was an experience Trip didn't want to repeat.

"It's gonna work, Malcolm. Trust me."

Malcolm raised his eyebrows. "You know, I do get worried when you say that."

Trip sighed. He wasn't going to admit it, but those words out of his mouth didn't exactly have a history that inspired confidence.

"We're gonna get out somehow," he said bravely.

"Yes," Malcolm rubbed a hand over his face. "Let's just hope that we're still in one piece when we do."

* * *

The scientists came for them an hour after the showing had ended. In the meantime, they had prepared everything there was to prepare, and offered only token resistance when they were led into the laboratory. Trip remembered the first time he'd seen the room, with its high examination tables and ominous equipment lined on the shelves. He'd almost shit himself when they had pulled the straps tight around his wrists and ankles, convinced that he was going to leave this place feet first, or maybe with his feet in one box and his head in another. He had soon realized that no one was going to chop him into pieces, but even so, the following hours had been unpleasant to say the least. And every night as he lay immobilized on their table, he couldn't help but wonder if it would be a scalpel instead of a stethoscope today, and acid rather than disinfectant solution. He didn't understand these people, or their utter disinterest in the fact that he was sentient and doing his damndest to establish communication. He had no way of knowing what they would and wouldn't do, and was pretty sure that they felt the same about him.

Tonight, this very lack of mutual understanding might work to his and Malcolm's advantage. If they could make this work, neither of them would have to endure any tests this time around. Although Trip had to admit that it was a big "if". Their plan, if one could call it that, wasn't exactly a textbook example of tactical thinking, as Malcolm had sourly pointed out. But as they were running out of alternatives, it was the only thing left for them to try.

Two of the keepers stood next to them, those large hands firmly closed around their arms while the assistants prepared the examination tables. Trip snuck a glance at the wall shelves. A sample box of sorts, Malcolm had said. There were about a thousand containers fitting that description, stacked on shelves that had been designed for people twice as tall as the average human.

"Where?" he asked.

"That counter over there," Malcolm said, matching his quiet tone. "Second shelf from the bottom, I believe."

"There're more than a hundred-" Trip began, but he didn't get very far. His keeper had grabbed him under the arms, and Trip found himself lifted off his feet like a recalcitrant toddler.

"Now!" he shouted, but it wasn't necessary. Malcolm had reacted immediately, whipping around, his teeth sinking deeply into the hand that was holding him. The keeper howled with pain and jumped back. A second later, Malcolm had slipped out of the restraints, which Trip had loosened earlier with the help of the microspanner.

"Better be quick!" he yelled, a second before pandemonium broke out in the lab. Dodging the hands that were grabbing for him, Malcolm ran towards the door, the keepers in hot pursuit. Trip kicked off his own restraints, his flailing foot connecting with something soft and hairy. The alien holding him cried out, but didn't let go. Aiming for the same place, Trip kicked again, harder than before, and this time he was unceremoniously dropped to the floor. Looking up from where he had landed, he was confronted with the unlikely sight of a giant chipmunk grabbing its lower abdomen, its large, furry face contorted with what Trip assumed was sudden and very intense pain. Obviously, he'd caught the guy in a place that was quite sensitive in males of all races.

He jumped to his feet. From the shouts and sounds of breaking glass coming from the other side of the room, Malcolm was still raising Cain back there. Leaving a whimpering keeper behind, Trip ran over to the counter, jumped, and pulled himself up onto the metal surface. His foot hit a tray of instruments which crashed to the floor, its contents flying everywhere.

Frantically, he began pulling containers off the shelf Malcolm had pointed out. A box of phials went flying, followed by a container with microscope slides. The glass shattered on the floor, empty boxes piling up around his feet.

Suddenly there was a loud snarl behind him, and Trip turned around just in time to escape a pair of hands lunging for him. It was the white-tailed assistant, and although Trip was no expert in chipmunk expressions, he could see that the guy was fit to be tied.

Without looking at it, he grabbed the first box he could get his hands on and hurled its contents into the alien's face. A cloud of white powder floated up, and Trip felt a sharp stinging in his eyes, mouth and nose. A snarl that sounded like a swear, followed by coughing and gagging, told him that the alien was faring no better.

Half-blind with tears, he grabbed the next box, which turned out to be empty.

"Trip!"

He couldn't see what was going on with Malcolm, but the panic in the Lieutenant's tone didn't bode well. The white powder burned like hell, as if someone had splashed ammoniac into his eyes. There was another crash from behind, followed by a cry that sounded definitely human.

"Dammit!" Trip squinted through the cloud of white powder. He could only make out mere silhouettes, but it looked as if the assistants had surrounded Malcolm, who had taken refuge behind a large garbage can. And if Trip wasn't entirely mistaken, the Lieutenant was pelting the aliens with whatever he could grab of the garbage inside.

"Will you bloody well hurry up!" he heard Malcolm's voice over the din. "They have some sort of taser – OW!"

"Mal, you okay?!"

"Just find the damn beacon!" Malcolm sounded strangled, and Trip resisted the urge to jump off the counter and run to his aid. There was preciously little he could do against a giant chipmunk with a taser, much less five of them.

He grabbed more boxes off the shelf, their contents spilling all over the counter. The tooth wasn't there. Desperately, he swept them down by the dozen, wincing when some of them landed on his bare toes. Malcolm had been right, their "plan" wasn't going to work, and would accomplish exactly nothing, except for wreaking havoc in the lab and, if he had interpreted the expression on the assistant's face correctly, getting themselves a good hiding.

Something hard struck him in the forehead. For a second or two, all he could see were bright sparks erupting in front of his eyes like crazy fireworks. He swayed, and would have fallen off the counter if he hadn't grabbed the shelf for balance. More containers came raining down from the upper shelves, one of them shattering only centimeters next to his right foot. In between the shards, Trip could make out something white and tiny.

"Got it!" he yelled triumphantly, grabbing the tooth. He spat out the microspanner which he'd kept hidden under his tongue, and was about to insert it into the beacon when a large hand closed around his ankle. He was swept off his feet and found himself hanging upside down in the air, the angry face of the white-tailed assistant hovering over him.

"Let me go!" He struggled wildly in the alien's grip, squirming and kicking. On the other side of the room, Malcolm had suffered a similar fate. One of the assistants had dragged him out from behind the garbage can and was holding him away at arm's length, obviously unwilling to get too close to the kicking and spitting alien creature.

"ACTIVATE THE BEACON, WILL YOU!" Malcolm shouted. "NOW!"

It was nearly impossible to hold on to the tiny tool and the tooth, let alone insert the first into the latter's opening. The assistant shook him angrily, snarling something in his guttural language.

"TRIP!" Malcolm yelled, and finally, almost on its own, the microspanner slid into the tiny hole.

"Got it!"

The alien shook him again, and this time the tooth slipped out of his fingers. Watching it fall, he knew that there was no way he'd find it again in the mess of shards, boxes and powder on the floor.

"What's going on?" Malcolm shouted. "Why aren't they-"

Trip felt a familiar tingle engulf him and opened his mouth, wanting to tell Malcolm that it had worked, but he never got past the first word. The lab disappeared before his eyes, and the next thing he knew was a sudden, loud thump, followed by a sharp pain in his head. Dizziness swept over him, and for a moment, all he could see were vague shapes, their colors blurring and merging into one another. The good news was that one of those shapes looked very much like one Captain Jonathan Archer.

"Trip?" Jon's voice seemed to come from far away. "Malcolm? You okay?"

Gradually, the outlines of his surroundings slid back into focus. Raising his head, Trip found himself sprawled on the transporter platform, where he had fallen after materializing in mid-air. Next to him, a naked and disheveled Malcolm Reed was sitting on his butt, a look of utter horror on his face.

Hoshi, Phlox, Travis, Jon and T'Pol were looking down at them, their expressions ranging from Vulcan indifference to ill-concealed amusement.

"Hi, Cap'n," Trip said, and dredged up a weak smile. "Good to be back."

Jon said something in reply, but Trip only saw his lips move. The pounding in his head became louder, his vision began to blur, and it was not without a certain relief that he realized he was about to pass out again.

* * *

When Trip woke up, it was to blessed silence. No shouting, no noise, no one whispering and pointing at him from behind a wall of glass. The lights had been dimmed, and all he could hear was the soothing hum of the bio monitors, and the occasional rustling from one of Phlox' animals. There was something to be said for sickbay, after all.

The pain was gone, too, except for a dull throbbing behind his left eyebrow. Slowly, as if he were moving under water, he brought up a hand and found that a band-aid had been applied to his forehead. And there was something attached to his arm. An IV. Trip stared at it for a second, then let his arm fall back onto the bed.

"Ah, back with the living, Commander!"

Very slowly, Trip turned his head. Phlox was smiling down at him, and he, too, was a welcome sight.

"Hi, doc," Trip said. His voice sounded strange, somewhat off.

"Don't move," Phlox admonished him gently. "You've got quite the concussion, not to mention a minor case of malnutrition. You should lie still and allow your body to rest."

Trip glanced down at himself, and discovered that he was wearing the mint-green sickbay pajamas they all detested so much. But after nine days of sitting stark naked in an alien cage, they, too, seemed a tolerable alternative.

"Where's Malcolm?" he asked, still in that strange, off-key voice. "He okay?"

"I'm right here, Trip."

Laboriously, Trip turned his head again and saw Malcolm on the biobed next to his, also wearing mint-green sickbay pajamas and also sporting a large band-aid over his left eyebrow.

_Disaster twins_, Trip thought, smiling a little. Thank God Malcolm seemed to be okay.

"I don't suppose we could rest in our quarters, doctor?"

Well, as okay as Malcolm would ever be in sickbay.

"Not right now, Lieutenant," Phlox said. "I'd like to keep you both for observation overnight."

Trip mouthed the next words along with Malcolm. "Really, doctor, I'm fine."

"Why don't you let me decide that, Lieutenant."

Trip had listened to this conversation so often he could have recited it in his sleep. Sleep. That seemed like a good idea. He was so very tired, and the familiar voices in the background lulled him in, his eyes drifting closed. It was a wonderful feeling. He pulled up the blanket to his shoulders, thinking how nice and warm it was, and how good it felt that there was no one staring at him, no one paying him the slightest bit of attention.

He had no idea that on the planet below, a group of Nuwa!r scientists were turning the building inside out in search of the two aliens who had so suddenly and inexplicably disappeared.

He didn't know about the crowd of disappointed visitors, clamoring for their money back.

He was also blissfully unaware of the fact that several hundred light-years away, Admiral Forrest was wishing for a hole to open under his feet while Ambassador Soval stared in disbelief at the image of two Starfleet officers, naked and on display for a crowd of goggling aliens.

And he couldn't have cared less if he had known. For once, it seemed, the universe had decided to give _him_ a break, and that was all that counted.

Sighing with relief, Trip Tucker drifted off to sleep.

* * *

Fer!i was no longer a zoo keeper. She had decided that she didn't like zoos, not anymore. Her strange-creatures had been allowed out of their confinement, and were playing under her watchful eyes on the steps in front of the house.

"Aren't you glad that you're not in the zoo anymore?" she asked her second-favorite animal-doll, the one she had decided was the yellow-furred strange-creature from town.

"Yes," he said. "Can I have more cake, please?"

He was always hungry.

"Here you go." Fer!i gave Yellow Fur a piece of _f'chna_ cake. "But share it with Dark Fur! He's smaller than you, and needs more food so he can grow!"

Dark Fur was her favorite animal-doll.

Yellow Fur wasn't greedy, and shared the cake readily enough, keeping the smaller piece for himself. Fer!i's strange-creatures were very well-mannered.

"We never got any cake in the zoo," Dark Fur said happily.

Fer!i petted his head. "Are you still angry because Mother locked you into the barrel?" she asked.

"No," he said. "I think I scared her. She didn't mean to hurt me."

Fer!i knew that Mother was never scared, but she didn't correct him.

"Time for bed," she told them. They began to protest, but when she showed them the nice, soft blankets she had found for them, they went, grumbling quietly.

"Strange-creatures need their sleep," she told Dark Fur. "Aren't you tired?"

"Maybe a little," he said when she tucked him in. "But I want to stay up and play."

"Tomorrow," she assured him. "Tomorrow you can play all day. Good night, strange-creatures!"

Yellow Fur had already fallen asleep. Fer!i found an extra blanket for her charges, and was just covering them up when she heard Mother's voice.

"Little one!"

She turned around and saw that Mother had come out of the house. She was holding a box in her hands; a box with holes on one side.

"Shhh," Fer!i flicked her ears in warning. "My strange-creatures are sleeping, and I don't want to wake them up."

"Oh." Mother smiled and came over. She put the box on the floor and knelt down next to Fer!i. "You take good care of them, don't you?"

"Yes," Fer!i said proudly. "I feed them and I make them beds and I send them to school even if they don't want to go."

Mother stroked her head. "You're doing a better job than the town people."

Fer!i looked up at her.

"The strange-creatures are gone," Mother explained. "They said it on the news. No one knows where they are."

And Fer!i was glad, although she couldn't have said why. "Do you think they are home now?"

Mother looked up at the red evening sky. The sun was disappearing behind the horizon, and the first stars were coming out. Soon, hundreds and thousands of them would brighten the dark sky, shining from far far away.

"Yes," Mother said. "I think they are."

Fer!i smiled, looking down at Yellow Fur and Dark Fur. "That's good," she said.

Mother hugged her to her side. "Don't you want to know what I have in the box, little one?"

"Yes," Fer!i said, and suddenly she was very excited. The box had holes! You didn't need boxes with holes for boring things like vegetables or firewood.

Mother smiled and lifted the lid off the box. Inside, on a bed of old blankets, sat a small, furry animal, its long tail wrapped around its hind legs. When it saw Fer!i, it blinked up at her out of large green eyes, squeaking softly.

"A baby _sh'c!n_!" Fer!i looked up at Mother. "Is is... is it for me?"

"Yes," Mother licked her ears. "I know you will take good care of it, little one."

Reaching into the box, Fer!i took out her new pet and cradled it to her chest. It was soft and warm, its white nose sniffing her fur.

"Don't worry," she told it. "You'll be my favorite now."

She looked at Dark Fur to see if he would mind, but he didn't. Snuggled into his blankets, he, too, had finally fallen fast asleep.

The End

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